Just A Little Practice
by kempokarate12
Summary: Santana knows she needs to practice being in a relationship before she can commit to Brittany. Otherwise she's terrified she'll lose the one thing she wants most in the entire world. My take on what might happen in the season finale.


**I know I should be working on Drop the Boy, but after everything that has happened recently I needed to get this down. I normally try to stay away from writing "What If" stories, but I couldn't help myself with this one.**

**So we've all seen / read the AfterEllen interview with Naya yes? Well, based on everything that was said and the hints that were given about Brittana's outcome, this is what I have come up with. Keep in mind I wrote it very quickly so it's not my best work.**

**I mainly wrote this for myself to give myself the closure that I wanted, but I figured I'd throw it up on FF / tumblr to see how people react. I'm not happy with it but for some reason I'm not too, too worried about that.**

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><p>It was only eight o'clock at night and yet everything was sound asleep. The birds were tucked away in bed; their simple melody no longer echoing through the maze of skyscrapers and idle taxi cabs. There wasn't a single vender open to sell bootleg merchandise to unsuspecting tourists for blocks, almost as if they knew this evening was going to be private. A light breeze danced gracefully along the streets of New York without a sound. It gently picked up a forgotten newspaper and twirled it around in elegant pirouettes before dropping it a few feet away. The gust of wind picked up and tenderly ruffled a mess of blonde hair so the once neatly combed bangs became disheveled. At that moment a shy hand reached up to carefully brush away the wayward strands of hair from the face it was unintentionally marring. Its dark complexion appeared even darker against the pale cheek it gently stroked on its way back to the pinky it had abandoned. When blue eyes could see clearly again they scrunched together in a thankful, yet annoyed, expression.<p>

"You know, I wouldn't need you to fix my hair if you'd just give me my hat back," a soft spoken Dutch girl informed as she playfully flicked the tip of a blue barrette resting atop her best friend's head.

"True," an equally feisty Latina shrugged while readjusting the hat. "But we both know it looks much better on me anyway."

The blonde allowed a genuine smile to appear on her face for a split second before it disappeared completely. Her blue eyes flickered to the ground sadly and she let a shaky breath escape her throat. "What are we doing Santana?"

"We're having a nice, quiet walk together."

"Yeah, but why?"

"I already told you. So we can forget about all the drama that has seemed to take over our lives."

"How come you want to forget?"

Santana sighed as she kicked a stone with her toe, "I don't _want_ to forget. I _need_ to forget."

"Why? Why do you need to forget so badly? Don't you want to remember everything you've done for me? Don't you want to remember everything we've been through together these past few weeks? Don't you want to remember what we said to each other?"

"No!"

"Why not?"

"Because Brittany! It hurts too much!"

Brittany immediately stopped dead; the sudden lack of movement forcing the smaller girl to whirl around in her spot. Her blue eyes instantly rimmed with tears as she questioned the flustered Latina before her. "WHY?"

"Is that all you can say right now? _Why?_" Santana was using every ounce of energy she could possibly muster to not start screaming at the dancer she was still attached to. Upsetting Brittany was the worst thing she could see herself doing, but right now she was having a hard time keeping her emotions in check.

"Well if you would just tell me why then I wouldn't have to keep asking! Why, Santana? Why does it hurt so much? What have I done to hurt you so badly you can't even talk to me anymore? We used to talk to each other about everything and now you won't even tell me what I did wrong! How can I make it better if you won't tell me?"

"It hurts, Britt, because I know we can't be together."

"What are you talking about? Yes we can!"

"No, we can't."

"But I broke up with Artie! I told you how I felt! You came out to everyone and sang those beautiful songs for me! We did everything we needed to do. Why can't we be together?"

By this point her tears were falling effortlessly down her face causing her mascara to practically start running a marathon, but she didn't care. The only person around for miles was Santana, and the brunette was the last person on Earth who would ever say something hurtful about the way she looked. Brittany had absolutely no problem accepting the fact that there was most likely snot coming out of her nose as she desperately tried to figure out what was happening.

Santana wanted nothing more than to be able to wipe away Brittany's tears but she couldn't. If she did, she knew she would instantly crumble to the ground in her own fit of hysterics. And she couldn't have that. Not if she was going to say everything she needed to say.

But she couldn't just stand there and watch her best friend cry. So, against her better judgment, the Latina latched onto both of Brittany's hands with her own squeezing them with all her might and took a cautious step forward so she was practically on top of the taller girl. Blue eyes pleaded with brown as the ex cheerleaders silently fought with one another.

"Brittany, listen to me. Are you listening?" The Dutch girl shook her head vigorously so her hair blocked her face from view. "You know I want to be with you more than I want my next breath of air. You know that! But we can't be together. At least not yet."

"Why not?"

"Because I need to work on myself for a little bit. And you need to work on you. You said so yourself."

The dancer jerked her head up, "I didn't mean it though! I only said that to Artie so he would stop bugging me about going to prom with him. I don't need to work on me I swear! I don't need to!"

"Yes you do. You need to take care of yourself before you feel like you need to take care of me."

"But I want to-!"

"No, listen. For the past… God I don't even know how long things have been this way for you. Ever since I've known you you've always been so busy taking care of other people you don't take the time to do what's best for yourself. You've always put the rest of the world before you and you need to stop. You need to stop placing your happiness behind everyone else's. You need to stop letting me walk all over you and let you down because I'm too scared to simply say how I really feel. It's not fair, what I'm doing to you. So what you need to do right now is you need to just take care of yourself for a while. You need to see what it's like to only worry about pleasing yourself. You need to know how to be happy because _you_ want to be happy; not because everyone is expecting you to be. And you need to know how it feels to not be hurt all the time. If you're with me then that's what's going to happen. I'll hurt you like I always do."

"No you won't!" The dancer held on to Santana's hands tighter than the brunette thought was possible. "You won't hurt me!"

"Yes I will. I'll mess up like I do every single time. When things get tough I'll run because that's what I do, Brittany. I run. I run when I'm angry, I run when I'm scared, and I run when I'm so deep in love I can't breathe. That's why I need time to work on myself. I can't keep running anymore. Not if I want to be there for you."

Keeping her gaze fixated on their hands, Brittany sniffed before quietly asking, "How are you going to do that?"

Santana took a deep breath, letting it out shakily as it tried to pass over the ever building tears. "I need to find someone to be with. Not like I was with Sam or Dave or any of those other guys. But someone who I can actually be with. Like… another girl."

The blonde immediately let go of Santana and took a step back from the stranger in front of her. She didn't know who she was looking at anymore. Sure the Latina was hypocritical at times, but never like this. Not when it came to Brittany's heart.

"WHAT?" Any evidence she had just been crying completely gone now that anger had taken over. "You just said you didn't want to hurt me! Well guess what! Being in a relationship with another girl, actually _wanting_ to be with them, right after you told me you needed to be with _me_ hurts! I can't watch that Santana. I can't. Seeing you with someone like that, someone you could fall in love with will hurt more than anything!"

"You think I want to do this? You think I want to hold hands with someone who isn't you? Do you really think I want to kiss another girl when I could be kissing you?"

"Then why are you going to?"

"Practice."

"Practice for what?" the dancer asked crossing her arms in front of her chest in a huff.

"For when I'm with you."

Without even thinking about what she was doing, the brunette had once again closed the gap between her and Brittany. But this time instead of intertwining her fingers with the Dutch girl's, Santana reached up to grab the back of Brittany's head with one hand and wrapped the other around her shoulder. At first Brittany attempted to dodge the Latina's touch, but it wasn't long before she gave in and dropped her head onto Santana's chest, burying her face amongst green and black stripes.

Even though the taller girl had surrendered herself to Santana physically, she wasn't about to hand her emotions over. She wanted to be stubborn. She wanted to be angry. She wanted to act like all of this wasn't killing her inside. But she knew that's exactly what it was: an act. And as she felt gentle hands running through her hair, Brittany let that act fully disappear in order to allow a fresh batch of tears soak through Santana's dress.

After a few, heartbreaking seconds a soft voice penetrated the dancer's cries. Though based on the way it was shaking, it was clear the owner was crying as well.

"You have no idea how much all of this terrifies me. Not just coming out to everyone and having the entire school know my secret, but what's going to happen when everything changes between us. I mean, how long have you known me?" Brittany's muffled voice wafted up to Santana and the brunette could only guess she had answered correctly. "Exactly. And in that amount of time how long have I taken care of anyone but myself? Never. I don't know _how_ to take care of anyone. I barely even know how to take care of myself. I don't know how to stick things through when it becomes scary. I don't know how to give someone all of my love without being afraid of the consequences. I don't know how _not_ to run.

"I run Brittany. That's what I do. You know that, I know that, everybody knows that. But at least if I run away from someone else I won't lose the most important person in my life. If I'm in a relationship with another person I can mess up as many times as I have to before I get it right and no one will get hurt. I can bail on them when they needed me the most, I can hide behind a song when I can't find my own words to tell them how I really feel and I can lie to their face without being afraid of them hating me. If I run from them, whoever they may be, the consequences won't matter. If I run from you I wouldn't be able to live with myself knowing that I lost the greatest thing to have ever happened to me.

"I can't risk that, what I have with you. You have given me so many free passes and one day those free passes are going to run out. One day you're going to get so fed up with everything that I put you through and you're going to realize you deserve so much better than me. I can't risk you leaving because I was too stupid to treat you the way I should treat the person I love. I need to practice screwing up with someone else so I don't screw up with you. It's for the best."

The blonde lifted her head so she was looking deep into brown eyes. Both girls had tears streaming down their cheeks, but their sadness was unable to hide the sheer love they had for one another. Neither one noticed that they were now clinging to each other's hands again.

"I don't want you to though," Brittany pouted.

"I don't want to either, babe. But if we're gonna make this work? I have to learn how to not be afraid. I need to make mistakes. I need to test the waters. But I can't do any of that to you. I have to hurt some other little girl instead."

"What if you fall in love with them?"

Santana shook her head, "Not possible. You're the only one for me Britt. No one will ever amount to you."

"Please don't do this," the Dutch girl whispered as she looked back down at the ground.

"Three months. Just give me three months and I promise I'll be ready. I promise I'll have made all the mistakes I needed to make and I promise I will give myself over to you fully with no regrets. That's all I'm asking. Three months."

"But that's the entire summer!"

"I know. It'll be hard but we'll get through it. Look at everything we've gotten through already. We'll make it, Brittany."

"You promise?"

"I promise. But now _you_ have to promise _me_ something."

"Anything."

"Promise you'll wait for me."

Brittany nodded her head with a sad, but genuine, smile, "Of course I'll wait for you. I'll wait as long as you need. Just don't take too long, okay?"

Santana couldn't help but let out a giggle at the dancer's request. "Don't worry. I won't." The Latina stole a moment to take in the blonde in front of her. She had no idea what she'd done to be blessed with such a remarkable girl in her life. Santana reached up to cup Brittany's cheek delicately in her hand, "I love you know you that?"

"I know. I just… I don't want you to go."

"I'm not going anywhere, B. I'm staying right here."

The Latina then slowly leaned forward until she caught Brittany's lips in her own. The two girls held the salty kiss for as long as they could savor its sweetness. When they eventually let go, they instinctually pressed their foreheads firmly together and closed their eyes.

They stayed like that, glued to each other not talking, for a long time before Santana's voice ultimately broke the silence.

"Wait for me."

"I will. Just don't go falling in love with some random chick or I'm going to have to get you to teach me how to hurt them."

"Sounds like a plan. It's okay, Britt. Everything's going to be okay."

"How do you can you say that?"

"Because I am so yours."

"Proudly so?"

"Yes. Proudly so," Santana smiled before going back in for one last kiss.

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><p><strong>I'll probably come back later and re-work the dialogue.<strong>

**But what did you guys think of this very rough draft?**


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